Friday, March 22, 2013

Education Reform and the Vietnam War- A Teacher's Lament

The Vietnam War was the Vietnam War for my generation. The war on
public education is somehow more insidious. At some point the media
exposed the Vietnam War for the debacle that it was. The vets came back
and their conflicted truths were at least entertained. I teach very
disabled students in the inner city, to atone for my family’s
involvement in banking and insurance. I even live in the inner city,
mostly because it is what I can afford on a teacher’s salary, but I also
quote Ruth, “'Entreat me not to leave thee, and to return from
following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou
lodgest, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, where thou diest,
will I die, and there will I be buried.” Yet I have somehow become the
scourge of America, the cause for all the failings of the United
States. I take (meager) hope in the fact that when soldiers came back
from Vietnam, they were literally spit upon. Thirty years later most
people understand the complexity of the situation. Some of the most
fabulous folks I know are in Veterans for Peace. I can wait 30 years,
gods willing I should live so long, for the acknowledgement that I teach
in an incredibly complex situation. My daughter can’t. She is in 7th
grade and needs education policy to change this summer.